CI611 Missing
 

Chinese Media is reporting that China Airlines B747 CI 611 has gone missing near ELATO en route to HKG from TPE. As I write this, it is over 90 minutes. Any other info from other sources???:(

From the Beeb

A Taiwanese airliner carrying more than 200 people is reported to have gone missing during a flight to Hong Kong.
China Airlines flight C1611 disappeared from radar screens near the Taiwanese island of Penghu at 0713 GMT, shortly after leaving the capital Taipei, television reports said.

Taiwan's air force and coast guard were looking for the aircraft, a government spokesman said.

A 747-200 by all accounts, however OAG states a 744

:(

Here is an article from Skynews:

Taiwan Plane Crash: 219 Feared Dead





A China Airlines passenger aircraft has crashed into the sea on a flight from Taiwan to Hong Kong.

The Boeing 747-200 was carrying more than 200 passengers and 19 crew on the 90-minute flight.


The jumbo jet took off from Taiwan's Taipei airport at 3.11 pm local time and disappeared off radar screens 19 minutes later.

Military planes and vessels have been deployed in the area.

China Airlines is the national carrier of Taiwan and the Taipei-Hong Kong route is one of the busiest in Asia.

"The cabinet has formed an emergency team to deal with the situation," said Taiwan government spokesman Chuang Suo-han.

More to follow....

When oh when are the Chinese authorities from both sides of the 'straights' going to stop killing people. Surely, even they now recognise enormous shortfalls in thier aviation industry?

China Airlines B747? Off Radar
 

So? 'twas a time when the prune always had the post before the media. But then again navels have always been so captivating.

19th hull loss for CI incl. 3 747´s now.
Type was confirmed as 747-200 (B-18255)
254 plus 19 crew on board.
What a terrible year and a disastrous safety record for CI.
I thought CI had emerged out of their safety troubles and was on the way of rebuilding customer confidence...
Wondering what could have gone wrong. No hint of any emergency call yet.

more @: www.jacdec.de

My condolences and sympathies to all the victims relatives and friends.

This route is known locally as the Golden Route because of the amount of traffiic it carries. As direct air links betwen Taiwan and mainland China are still banned, a lot of travellers route via Hong Kong.
According to IATA, the route carried 4.7miilion passengers in 200, double the second busiest route between SG and KL.

Cathay Pacific and China Ailines between them do over 80% of the flights. CX does around 15 flights a day.

Local news media is now reporting that at least one body has been recovered from the water.

Condolences too all involved.

Here we go again! Armchair experts with statistics at hand. You could at least wait until the wreckage is located, not to mention the FDR.:mad:

This post has been inserted in the wrong place.HD

Hotdog, my apologies if I offended you. I do not claim to be an expert and I am certainly making no comments on the cause of the crash, just reporting information that others may not have.
I do have the advantage at the moment of having access to local media and the ability to get rt translation from Cantonese and Mandarin to English.

It's not you stickyb, you are quoting facts not connected to this accident.

HotDog
Just a reminder this is a Rumour Network. That is a network that is concerned with rumours. Maybe you pressed the wrong keys? Maybe you were looking for PPCrCi (The Pussy Preeners Crochet Circle)??

Hot Dog:

Too much chilli on your dog today?

All posts prior to your outburst are fair comment. Commercial airline operations on either side of the Taiwan Strait over the last 20 years are statistically proven to be of greater risk than in Europe or the US.

No one has ventured any guess as to the cause of the crash, so what's the point of your criticism of previous posters?

New record.

Within 90 minutes of original posting of this tragic accident the slagging has started.
45 years in aviation and 20000hrs in the logbook, sit back and relax Hot Dog.

Best regards
AV

>I thought CI had emerged out of their safety troubles and was >on the way of rebuilding customer confidence...

Ermmm we don't know the cause yet - it may have been nothing to do with (your implied) Pilot error

>Wondering what could have gone wrong.

Exactly.

This better not turn into another TW800 bullsh*t-fest.

Another terrible accident.

I cannot confirm or dispute whether China Airlines safety record was improving. But wasn't it China Airlines that took off on a taxi way at Alaska, which was 90 degrees off the direction of the runway (as well as being very narrow and almost too short for the aircraft to get airborne), leaving tyre tracks in the snow bank at the end of it?

Just a little note:

The plane (747-200D, B18255) is 22.8 years old and logged about 65000 (Edited: 64810) flight hours and 21000 (Edited: 21398) landings. It was to be flown to HK as it's last passenger flight for CI and back to Taipei at night, refurnished and sold to Orient Thai Airlines in June.

So The plane's last passenger flight for CI proved to be the last flight for the plane itself.

More: A check was done May 3rd, B check done April 4th, C check done November 25th 2001. Captain and Co-pilot both have about 10000 hrs and flight engineer have roughly 18000.

Edited again for spelling mistakes. :)

CI 611
 

Peanut Butter beat me to the same info' - Orient Thai will have to look elsewhere for a replacement.
By the 320 Driver - completely agree with you !!!

Peanut Butter, that's very interesting...

It seems almost too awesome a coincidence that this plane crashed on its last revenue flight (having said that - Peanut Butter, what's your source for this piece of info?)

I've often wondered about the economic temptation that airlines must have to under service airframes that are about to be sold on. I wonder how many 'known but acceptable' faults this particular B747-200 was flying with...

Does anyone have any first hand experience of CI's record in this particular area? Has anyone, for example, acquired an ex-CI aircraft?

Sorry to be feeding speculation - but that's life and this *is* a rumour network!

J-Class:

I just happened to be like Stickyb which I know both Cantonese and Mandarin and also having access to local media. (Thank god for Satallite TV!)

I wonder if there's any chance that the forum members could cite a few facts or rumours of facts regarding this accident before insuating defects in safety.

I don't mind commenting about facts and what if's but slagging matches aint my game.

Early on I heard that the aircraft was at 35000 ft, if true, then any fuel in the tanks is surely way above ignition temps.

I also heard that local farmers had found a piece with a logo on it in their field. This could be sgnificant. Anybody with more info?

I can't recall any previous history with B747 that lead to any suspicion of cause for a flight just after reaching 35,000 ft either as a mechanical or crew error

What we really need is the ability to edit the thread titles so that the readers can understand what the cntinuing thread is about.

For instance I've seen thread titles in the past where the title screams that XXX Crashed today !! yet the thread is days old and its really all about an old crash. (figuring that planes crash once a week )

Then we have the multiple threads about this latest China Crash saying the plane is missing, when in fact wreckage has been found.

These thread titles are too time specific and therefor short lived.

If I was a moderator, I would merge them into a more general thread early on.

As far as I can tell from HK TV with the aid of some local translation, there is debris spread over a very wide area (on land and sea) which is being taken to show a substantial midair breakup. It is also reported that two nearby CX pilots report hearing a distress call from the CI plane, but there are no further details.

On the TV news here they are showing much light weight scattered wind blown debris being picked up on the island. Paper, light weight insulation material etc.

Christep:

I'm pretty sure the distress calls are from the ELT, There were no radio transmission that I know of which indicates a distress call. I'm also seeing pictures of baggage tags, cash, traveller's cheque and other debris lying around.

There's all sorts of rumors about the cause of the crash like CAT, being struck by a meteor, or even a terrorist bomb plot....perhaps another conspiracy after TWA800? :D

The airline has posted a complete crew and passenger list, plus other bits of information, here:

http://www.china-airlines.com/us/index.htm

Initial media reports said missing. Later confirmed as a loss.

My condolences and sympathy to the families and friends of those who perished in the crash.
Another sad day for the aviation community.

Thats really going to help Analyser.
Talk about well worn cliches !!!
I thought we were going to give up all that crap.
It means ABSOLUTLY NOTHING !!

It is simply Mealy Mouthed Garbage

Within seconds, the Boeing vs Airbus neanderthals swarmed in like weird piranhas...

Just following on from the "last commercial flight...." point. I have no idea as to the ownership/lease state of the aircraft but if it was subject to some kind of leasing deal they usually require the aircraft to be returned in the state in which it was first obtained. So as such, would have to be kept up to date with maintenance etc. In my limited experience of obtaining previously owned/leased aircraft there are always "minor" tech problems but usually associated with the leasing requirements not airworthiness requirements. For what it's worth...

Crew List
 

Thanks stickyb.
Can anyone translate and post the Tech Crew names?

Excerpts from the New York Times:

"The Aviation Safety Council, Taiwan's air safety regulator, said rescuers began finding bodies and wreckage in the water less than three hours later about 12 miles north of Makung, the county seat of the Penghu Islands near the southern end of the Taiwan Strait. That would put the crash site within Taiwan waters....

"Papers and even foam scraps from the aircraft's seats began floating into rice paddies up to 60 miles east of the crash site on the main island of Taiwan, local television here reported, prompting discussion of whether the plane came apart at high altitude......

"Civilian and military rescuers plan to begin an underwater search on Sunday morning; the plane crashed in about 80 feet of water."

If 80 feet is accurate, that should help in recovery of the recorders. And IF the 'foam scraps from seats' is also accurate, that may indicate an explosive decompression at 35000 feet.

There are many ways to Romanize Chinese names, especially in Taiwan. I will try to use a simplified variation of Wade-Giles that is commonly used in Taiwan (and China's Hanyu Pinyin in parenthesis)

Captain: Yi Ching-Fung (Yi Qing-Feng)
Co-pilot: Hsieh Ya-Hsiung (Xie Ya-Xiong)
Flight Engineer: Chao Sheng-Kuo (Zhao Sheng-Guo)

Psittacine, if you follow the link I gave earlier, look at the 1900 hours release, and you will seee the names there, along with such things as flying hours.
Alternatively, here:
http://www.china-airlines.com/us/e_n.../20020525b.htm

Terribly sad for all concerned. Media started reporting the story where I live by showing footage of the families as usual being swarmed at the airport by camera crews itching to get that heartbreaking facial expression or first tear. Am I the only one whos getting thoroughly sick of having the media treat the worst moment in these peoples lives as an opportunity to score rating points? If someone did that to me at the airport theyd have a whole new story on their withered little hands.

From the Ananova site.


--------------------------------------------------------------
China Airlines jet broke up in the sky.

A Hong Kong-bound China Airlines jet broke up in the sky before crashing into the Taiwan Strait with 225 people on board, says the chief Taiwanese crash investigator.

Military radar provided a clear picture of the Boeing 747- 200 splitting up into four pieces, said Kay Yong, managing director of Taiwan's Aviation Safety Council.

"There was an in-flight break-up above the altitude of 30 thousand feet. We are very positive about this," he said.
---------------------------------------------------------------

You can hardly blame that on the crew or China Airlines, it would seem.